Cheap vs expensive DAC?

[Rroff]

The accepted wisdom is pretty much that there is no point buying either a dedicated DAC or amp unless your inbuilt DAC is **** (and yes, pretty much every audio device has a DAC)

I see some integrated audio implementations that measure very well in any scientific test - but if you listen to the same implementation side by side with something that has better routing of the traces, boutique capacitors instead of general purpose ones, etc. etc. it sounds noticeably dull side by side despite the measurements for SNR and THD, etc. etc. being close to identical between them.

 

[MagicBoy]

When using Bluetooth headphones, is the phone's/players DAC completely bypassed and its the headphones DAC which is ultimately used?

Yeah, it's not converting anything digital to analogue. Device pipes the digital audio output into the Bluetooth module, where it's transmitted to the headphones, decoded and turned into sound waves. Also keep in mind bluetooth uses lossy compression to transmit audio as there's not enough bandwidth for uncompressed audio.

TL;DR Standalone DAC should be used with wired headphones.

 

[kona786]

Yeah, it's not converting anything digital to analogue. Device pipes the digital audio output into the Bluetooth module, where it's transmitted to the headphones, decoded and turned into sound waves. Also keep in mind bluetooth uses lossy compression to transmit audio as there's not enough bandwidth for uncompressed audio.

TL;DR Standalone DAC should be used with wired headphones.

Cheers for clearing that up.

Bluetooth has come along way for me and the convenience outweighs any SQ worries.

 

[Roadrunner_668]

interesting i assumed the phone would always play more of a part in it than that , like when using a dac with a wire

but i guess that makes sense if its just sending the 1s and 0s to the dac

 

[Frubeling]

Considering the cables end up connecting to a public mains supply..

good line conditioning filter (ie block EMI and maintain stability) to prevent the +/-10% for mains 230 is all you need at the top end..

Honestly an extension lead with inbuilt conditioning is one of the best "cheap" (£50 is cheap tbh when you weigh it up against all the other parts of a system) investments I've made in audio

 

[NickK]

interesting i assumed the phone would always play more of a part in it than that , like when using a dac with a wire

but i guess that makes sense if its just sending the 1s and 0s to the dac

A phone can still play in the digital domain and therefore have plenty of impact. Digital Filters, etc but the headphones need to convert the BT digital to analogue..

 

[jpaul]

Phones/Blue-tooth - yes the digital side can make a right mess, a minefield

If you have a BT profile on your phone+headphones that supports bit-streaming the original codec, and your phone player app cooperates, then you can send the original AAC music encode - best.
Apple has some lossless BT profiles that their headphones support (alac with bionic chip) , and AptX elsewhere is also near lossless, but both incur a music re-encode , burning the battery.
If the phone player is sending the music through the Android sound mixer it may also be re-sampling the music from 44.1KHz/cd to android 48Khz.

If you want the benefit of using an equalizer on the phone too (filters) it will re-encode.

 

[Roadrunner_668]

A phone can still play in the digital domain and therefore have plenty of impact. Digital Filters, etc but the headphones need to convert the BT digital to analogue..

yep